Electronics firm ready for ‘choppy waters’

FIFE: Dynamic EMS looks for opportunities post-covid

A Fife electronics manufacturer has identified several areas of opportunities as the economy emerges from the Covid-19 lockdown.

Dynamic EMS owner John Dignan, pictured, expects there to be growth in the areas of wearable technology, remote patient monitoring, medical applications, AI and smart buildings.

The Dalgety Bay firm, which produces bespoke electronics, has continued to operate throughout the pandemic and has a workforce of 90 staff.

Newly filed accounts showed the company recorded sales of almost £9.8 million for the year ending December 31 2019, with pre-tax profits of £510,000 compared to £101,000 in 2018.

Mr Dignan joined the business in 2005, became managing director in 2011 and subsequently acquired the company in 2014.

He said Dynamic EMS was in a strong position to weather an anticipated slowdown in orders in the second half of this year.

“We had a lot of organic growth last year, which drove higher revenues and profits,” he said.

“We work with developmental companies in emerging markets and some of our current customers have products that have reached market maturity.

“The strong sales were maintained for the first quarter of this year and we were well on our way to meet our targets but that’s now taken a bit of a dent due to Covid-19.

“We’ve got a good cash position and customer base, now we’ve just got to navigate ourselves through the choppy waters in the second half of this year.”

Dynamic EMS has been involved for many years with customers maintaining critical national infrastructure, clean water systems, wastewater treatments, utilities, fire prevention systems and the national grid.

The firm has engaged with organisations involved in blood analysis and disease detection, contamination monitoring and antibody diagnostic testing. The company also engaged with part of the UK Ventilators Challenge community, manufacturing certain components, and some of its systems ended up in the new NHS field hospitals.

“These were products we were building already so we were able to ramp up production,” Mr Dignan said.

“There will certainly be opportunities for the specialist electronics we can offer after Covid-19.”

Dynamic EMS can trace its history to 1957 when Rochester UK was incorporated as a sister company of Rochester Inc. USA and operated from Kent.

In 1989 Rochester Instrument Systems acquired Highland Electronics Alarm Systems and its associated contract electronics manufacturing business, and the entire manufacturing operation was relocated to Fife.

The business name was changed to Dynamic Logic in 2000 and then to Dynamic EMS when a management buyout took place in 2005.

Mr Dignan added: “As a business we have grown the services we offered clients. When we get customers under our roof, they tend to stay with us for a long time.”

“There will certainly be opportunities for the specialist electronics we can offer after Covid-19.

JOHN DIGNAN

Dynamic EMS manufactures bespoke electronics from Dalgety Bay.